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Coincidence, Timing, and "Ow! My Toes!"
Just got my ass kicked by a kid in a wheelchair. Brain Candy
I started reading Neil Gaiman's American Gods. I'm not very far into it. Far enough to get the idea of the setup, but details still being hidden from me. | ||||||
Where to begin?
Well, for starters, she's older than me.
"Old enough to have been your babysitter," as she puts it. "Maybe your mother, if we lived in The South." Age didn't even occur to me until she asked me how old I was. I've never really had a guage or a preference when it came to age. I figure, if she's got nice tits then who am I to split hairs?
She's got a mix of beliefs. I suppose the easiest way to sum her up would be to say she is a New Age Hedonistic Christian. That is to say, she believes that God intentionally put us together, because God wants her to have good sex. I have willfully chosen not to point out any flaws in her theory.
This is the story I haven't told yet. This is one of those stories that you tell to your closest friends. Publishing it, however limitedly, could have ramifications. And, even though I was just recently bitch-slapped for making private matters public, I'm doing this anyway. Mainly because I am a writer and this is how I express myself. I'm sure Stephen King has gotten his fair share of shit for telling the whole world about the time his sister killed all the cats in the neighborhood, and then brought them back to life with the help of a clown that lived in the sewer. We writers face this risk every day.
This is the kind of story you pull out in private conversation. When everyone is drunk and swaping stories, narrating each of our personal tales of how strange/exciting/dangerous/eerie life is for us, one upping each other with every tale. This is the story I will tell untill the day I die.
The night Kitten and I met, she was staying at a hotel two blocks from the bar we met at. She lives about an hour train ride away, and had to be at work early in the morning for a meeting. On the way there, I explained the origin behind the name "Doc." She didn't seem very amused by it. I'm not even sure she was listening.
It occurs to me how many amusing and frightening stories there are that begin with "things were moving along as you would expect, when suddenly she stopped." Now I know why.
"There's something I need to show you," she says.
Shit, I think to myself, this never means anything good.
She pulls a locket out of her purse. Not one of those little tiny necklace lockets. This was about the size of my hand. She opens it up and hands it to me. Inside are two pictures of Kitten with some guy who looks just like me. His chin stuck out a little more than mine, but otherwise it was an uncanny resemblence. We even have the same hair.
"Oh...shit," I say.
"Yeah," she says.
"Um, so....who is this?" I ask. It seemed like the thing to ask.
"He's my fiance," she replies. "He died two years ago."
"Ah," I say.
A moment of silence takes place. Not out of respect, mind you. I was at a loss for words.
"Are you mad?" she asked me.
"No," which is what I would have said either way. But in this case, it was true.
"Are you creeped out?" she asked next.
"Uh, a little."
She pauses for another few seconds.
"Do you still want to have sex?" she asks.
My first thought was "Hey, I'm not the one who's dead." But, at the last second I decided that wouldn't be funny. A simple "Yes" sufficed for that moment.
The Dead Guy has been a bit of a shadow. She doesn't yell out his name during sex or anything, but she does play his CD's an awful lot.
In her condo she has one of those little nooks in the wall, like a small window that isn't a window. I'd never seen these nooks in real life beofore, only in movies. In the movies, that's where the stereotypical mexican family put their little shrines to Jesus. She, of course, has a shrine to the Dead Guy.
She still spends time with his parents and friends. The last few weeks have been trying, as it seems everyone attached to this guy is just now starting to deal with the emotions involved with his death. That's a little beyond me since I come from two families that seem to be able to deal and move on within a few months. I've never been weighted down by death. Then again, both my parents, both my children, all my siblings, and all my friends are still alive; so I guess I don't really get it.
The Dead Guy died of a heroin overdose. Kitten didn't even know he was using again. Yeah, one of those stories.
His friends are still using. Kitten is a successful corporate business woman, but she hangs out with heroin addicts because she cares for them just as much as her Dead Fiance did. I'd try to do something about it, but after my ordeal with She-Bitch, my father made me promise not to try rescuing people anymore.
The other night she called me up to tell me that she had just driven one of them to rehab. She's going to try and wrangle another one in tomorrow before she flys out to California for a business trip.
I try to console her, give her Doc-like words of wisdom...
...She tells me to shut the hell up and meet her at her place, because she really needs a good fuck right now.
That doesn't count as rescuing, does it?
We're already getting to the point where we're saying out goodbyes. When we first got together, we agreed that this was just going to be a casual, friendly, fuck-buddy kind of thing until I was wisked away to China. I introduced her to Firefly, and she took me to my first oyster bar.
There was a time there, about a month or so back, that we stopped having sex. She was thinking of going back to an ex-boyfriend, and so we cooled it so that it wouldn't make things weird between them. It was then that I realized that our relationship wasn't just based on sex. We were friends. We hung out and had a good time. When neither of us were playing the monogomy game with anyone else, we played with each other. She even loved to hear my stories about my nights out with Prancer, hiting on strange women in bars.
Since I've been having problems on the matter of my legal ability to leave the fucking country, this has lasted longer than either of us had planned. Last night, we got to talking about the other things in our life that are taking up our time, and we both agreed that we've got a lot of more important things to deal with than schedule sex time against each other. We'll probably go on for another couple of weeks, but we're pretty much done.
This is the first time I've really felt fulfilled by a relationship. Walking in and walking out without asking myself what I did wrong. We both knew what we wanted from each other, how long we would want it, so on and so forth. We never had to sit down and cry over where we thought we were going. We never had to hold grudges because one of us went out with our friends one night instead of calling. Hell, she never even asked me if she looked fat in those pants.
I remember some years back, just after High School, when Hollywood Mike and I were lamenting about our shared women troubles. Even as far back as then I was livid with the dance of insanity that is "The Dating Game."
"Why do we have to do this shit?" I was saying to Mike, "Why can't we have the balls to just walk up to girls and say 'Hey, this is what I want. Does it jive with what you want? 'Cause if so, let's give it a shot and see what happens.' And for that matter, why can't they. Why do they always just sit there and wait for us to come to them with some song and dance? Why can't we all just be honest and straight-forward with each other?"
(Apparently, Mike took that to heart and used it to get his next long-term girlfriend within a week. I remained a coward and stayed single for the following year.)
The point is, my relationship with Kitten is very simple. We're friends. Yes, we have sex, but that doesn't change the fact that we're friends. I don't have to consider the ramifications of saying I love her. I do love her. I love her in the same way that I love all of my friends, my family, my children. I care about her and her well being. When I leave, I'm going to miss her as much as I'll miss everyone else I'm leaving behind.
Few people realize the power of true friendship and that level of infalable love. I have had many altercations with my friends, but the fact that we are friends and know that we will always be friends have kept us from letting these things go too far. Girlfriends and lovers hold the threat of leaving your life forever as a way to keep the relationship dynamic in a static holding pattern. "Where are we going?" and "Is she really right for me?" haunt us as keep ourselves from becoming as comfortable with our "significant other" as we are with our everyday friends.
I'm rambling now. I'm trying to make a point and I'm not sure how to make it.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, I like having friends who are girls that I have sex with. So far, it's been much more fulfilling than any of my "capitol R" Relationships. I think it has to do with the fact that we are friends first. The sex is simply there as a pastime, something to do that is fun. Kitten and I would have gotten along fine and made good friends, even if we never had sex. But, since she meets all of my criteria for a sexual partner (she's a girl), and I meet all of her criteria (I'm a boy, under the age of 30), then we go ahead and enjoy each other's company in that way. When we stop having sex, we can stay friends without having a "breakup."
I play pool with Prancer and The Clown. I go to movies with Hollywood Mike and Saint Burton. I make movies with Frogman and TankGirl. I have sex with Kitten. Even when I'm not doing these things with these people, I'm still their friend. This is just how friendship works for me, and it works for me just fine.
Crap, I'm still not making my point. I'm talking and talking without saying a goddamn thing, like a fucking politician.
Screw it. I give up. I know what I'm talking about and that's what matters. Maybe if I make a movie out of this someday, I can make it make more sense. We'll see.
Boysies.
Thanks to the jagoffs at Fark.com I've been made aware of a recent update concerning an industry prediction I made some time ago.
I love being right. It's not as though anyone was saying I was wrong. And I'm sure I wasn't even close to being the first person to say this. But it still feels good.
TTFN
The Doc -- [noun]: An immortal 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com |
Sometimes I forget that people I care about actually read this blog.
I don't know how I could forget, since they always are nice enough to give me their two cents on a regular basis. But it happens.
I use this blog as a means to track myself. A journal of sorts. Jotting down my mental state at any given time for me to look back on, while at the same time getting ego points on the idea that my words are infecting the great global network.
As it is, my blog is as fluid as I am. Mental states and decisions change on a whim. Things are said without the right amount of forethough and those close to me are hurt.
Speaking out of turn, talking out my ass...however you want to say it. My opinion is just my opinion and I'd be the first to admit that I could be wrong (sometimes). But that does not excuse a disregard for others.
I'm sorry.
From now on, if I have something to say to you, I'll say it to you. No more off the cuff remarks in the third person like some gossip columnist.
From now on, what's between us will be between us.
Boysies.
Taking a cue from Hollywood Mike, I'd gotten into thinking about music. More specifically, music that speaks to one's own purpose. It's strange how one can sometimes come across a song that somehow says everything you've been thinking, translating everything you've been feeling into the words that you yourself could not think of. It makes you wonder if someone is watching you, composing the soundtrack of your life without your permission.
Paranoia asside, my thoughts fell on a peice that I've known about since my mom got the CD many years ago. It was only just a few months ago that I really started to understand what it meant.
To Beat The Devil
Music and Lyrics by Kris Krisofferson
From the album Me & Bobby McGee
It was winter time in Nashville, down on music city row.
And I was lookin' for a place to get myself out of the cold.
To warm the frozen feelin' that was eatin' at my soul.
Keep the chilly wind off my guitar.
My thirsty wanted whisky; my hungry needed beans,
But it'd been of month of paydays since I'd heard that eagle scream.
So with a stomach full of empty and a pocket full of dreams,
I left my pride and stepped inside a bar.
(Actually, I guess you'd call it a Tavern)
Cigarette smoke to the ceiling and sawdust on the floor;
Friendly shadows.
I saw that there was just one old man sittin' at the bar.
And in the mirror I could see him checkin' me and my guitar.
An' he turned and said: "Come up here boy, and show us what you are."
I said: "I'm dry." He bought me a beer.
He nodded at my guitar and said: "It's a tough life, ain't it?"
I just looked at him. He said: "You ain't makin' any money, are you?"
I said: "You've been readin' my mail."
He just smiled and said: "Let me see that guitar.
"I've got something you oughta hear."
Then he laid it on me:
"If you waste your time a-talkin' to the people who don't listen,
To the things that you are sayin', who do you think's gonna hear.
And if you should die explainin' how the things that they complain about,
Are things they could be changin', who do you think's gonna care?"
"There were other lonely singers in a world turned deaf and blind,
Who were crucified for what they tried to show.
And their voices have been scattered by the swirling winds of time.
'Cos the truth remains that no-one wants to know."
Well, the old man was a stranger, but I'd heard his song before,
Back when failure had me locked out on the wrong side of the door.
When no-one stood behind me but my shadow on the floor,
And lonesome was more than a state of mind.
You see, the devil haunts a hungry man,
If you don't wanna join him, you got to beat him.
I ain't sayin' I beat the devil, but I drank his beer for nothing.
Then I stole his song.
And you still can hear me singin' to the people who don't listen,
To the things that I am sayin', prayin' someone's gonna hear.
And I guess I'll die explaining how the things that they complain about,
Are things they could be changin', hopin' someone's gonna care.
I was born a lonely singer, and I'm bound to die the same,
But I've got to feed the hunger in my soul.
And if I never have a nickle, I won't ever die ashamed.
'Cos I don't believe that no-one wants to know.
The message I'm hearing from Kristofferson is not quite as Christian as some folks I've talked to have first thought. Metaphorically speaking "The Devil" is very simply the embodiment of all things that keep our society fat, stupid, and dependant on corrupt leadership (i.e. churches). Anything that neuters your own sense of what's "right" and "true" is the work of the devil. When you give up on something you love, and trade it in for what everyone else is doing (or thinks you should do) you are giving into the devil's temptation by way of "path of least resistance."
In recent days, I visited my home and my kids. I resolved to give myself one last chance to make good on my goals before I gave in and returned to live as a father and nothing else.
After listening to this song agian, and once more taking to heart what it meant, I've decided that giving up is a stupid idea. As I said before, I would have no right looking my children in the eye and telling them how important it is to never give up when I myself gave up on everything. I think the entire idea was humored mainly because of the overwhelming reception I recieved, as well as a long repressed homesickness. Now that time has gone by and I've had the chance to clear my head (and shake the hangover) I realize now that moving back to Portland would be a grave, grave mistake.
It's not like moving back to Portland is going to make everything better. I'll still have She-Bitch throwing every obstical she can between me and my kids. My father will still look down on me as some Brave New World Gamma. Cunt will still be there, lecturing me on how to live my life as she continually pours wine into the wailing void of her own meaningless existence. Even my friends in Portland, fun and loving as they are, seem to be drowning in pessimism and compromise.
I'd much rather be with people like Frogman and Tankgirl. People who actually beleive in me and are excited with the idea of helping me acheive my goals, however kooky and out of touch they are.
I feel likeminded with Krisofferson in this one. Even if I should die poor, hungry, and alone in some ditch somewhere like a renaissance poet, at least I will do so with my head held high and my soul intact (so to speak).
Boysies.
P.S.
Thanks to Swish for setting me straight on this one.
P.P.S.
Russ Meyer didn't make his first movie 'till he was 32. 5 years later, he was a multi-millionare. So you all can shut the hell up for the time being.
I finished the Russ Meyer biography that I was reading. I've always enjoyed Meyer's movies on a very base level. Hot women, crude humor, fast cuts, rough music. Not really the kinds of films you'd want to sit down and discect, discussing the subtle motivations behind characters like SuperVixen or Junkyard Sal. They make better background atmosphere for parties. Good for a laugh and a fresh crop of inside jokes for you and your equally perverted friends.
It's a hoot to read about how seriously Meyer took himself. He didn't take his work seriously, he would be the first person to admit that his films were fodder for "raincoat men." However, he saw himself as some sort of Picasso. Even with the amazing women and tireless crew that held his films together (dispite his constant and unrelenting verbal abuse), he took all the credit for the success of his films. He was, in short, an asshole.
What is it about the greatest artistic minds of our time having reputations for being total dicks? Time after time, you hear the stories of how someone you looked up to as some form of inspiration or another, was in fact abusive, underhanded, adulterous, or addicted to something that killed them within a decade. Meyer was an abusive control freak. Kubrick was obsesive. Hemmingway was a drunk. Thomas Jefferson owned slaves. Ben Franklin liked sleeping with married women. Rumor has it, Tarantino is a shitty tipper. Why is it people who have somehow been gifted with the talent, knowlege, and wherewithall to push our society into the next step of evolution, also seem to be complete jackasses in just about every other parts of their lives. The only great mind that I've ever heard favorable things about concerning character was Albert Einstein, but he could never remember to tie his shoes.
Saint Burton and I discussed this once, many years ago. The theory we came up with was a Role Playing Game metaphore (because we're absolute losers). When creating a new character for an RPG, you are given a limited number of points to distribute among the character's atributes. Your character can be very fast, but would in turn be weak, and maybe stupid. Adding pionts to one trait means taking the points away from others. Could it be that this closer to real life than anyone imagined? Could it be that the reason Kubrick was able to make a masterpeice like Barry Lyndon was because he was simply overdeveloped in visual judgement and underdeveloped in basic human sanity?
What does that say about me? Does this mean that if I want to be a great filmmaker/writer, I'm going to have to concentrate more psychic energy on my work and let my manners and hygene go?
Well, fuck that.
Ever since I started this whole "being a better person" crap, I've found that more and more people are happy to see me. Granted, I'm not getting laid as much, but friends I've made seem to be going out of their way to include me in...whatever. I could use this to my advantage. I could gather a small army of loyal drinking buddies and use them to conquer Norway.
I think this is best summed up in one of my favorite lines from Firefly. In the episode titled "Jaynestown," mercenary Jayne is pained over why a town full of indentured servants would want to erect a statue in honor of a bastard like him. Captain Mal responds with "It seems to me that just about every fella who ever had a statue made of him was some kind of son-of-a-bitch. It ain't about you, Jayne. It's about what they need."
That makes a lot of sense to me. Who really gives shit about whether Meyer, Kubrick, or Jefferson were nice guys or not. None of us can call ourselves saints (except Burton), but they at least did some great good along with their mistakes. How many of us can claim that? We take the good that they did and revel in it. Honor the deeds, the triumphs, and the progress. Honor not the man, for the man is an asshole.
Boysies.
It's like I'm the star of a spinoff series, and I just finished a crossover into the origional. Like whenever David Boreanez appeared on Buffy.
I was in Portland for part of the weekend. I was there mainly to visit with my kids, but it coincidentally coincided with Hollywood Mike's birthday. I didn't get him anything.
I got to catch up with some old friends, putting my two cents in on all the latest plotlines and backstory. It really was like guest appearing on a TV show that I used to star on. The tragic drama of The She-Bitch. The kooky comedy that is Saint Burton. The irreverent comedy/drama of Hollywood Mike. Each of them had a special guest appearence from The Doc, former main character. He walks in, complicates things, throws out a few one-liners, and exits. I was the Sweeps Week episode.
Now that I'm back on my own show (the ratings are tanking, btw), I'm getting ready to close out the season, wrapping up a few loose backstories in order to set up the clifhanger that brings you back next fall. This trip to China will be the last big push. Sink or swim. If China fails, I'm canceled...off the air for good, doomed to spend the rest of my days as Hollywood Mike's tragically funny friend that makes everyone laugh because he's so witty but is obviously dying inside. Like the final season of Quantum Leap when they tried to infuse aliens, ghosts, and [gasp] evil leapers into the show. When that didn't bring the ratings up, they left Dr. Beckett in Quantum Limbo and Scott Bakula is stuck playing the one-dimensional Don Juan archetype on Murphy Brown.
Life really gets scary when you start thinking of it like a metephorical TV show. Just ask Hollywood Mike. He's been living in a John Cusak movie for the last 10 years. I think it's starting to effect his mind.
The time I spent with Pink and Monkeyboy was fantastic. Pink is learning to play pool. She can't quite handle the cue right, but she plans out a shot better than I could when I was a teenager, let alone 7. Then she beat me at checkers, just before going on to play a basketball game against a bunch of second and third graders.
Monkeyboy, meanwhile, can handle a camera with an uncanny expertise. When doing cable access videos in high school, I lost my temper with a lot of cameramen that couldn't frame a one-shot to save their life. My four-year-old son left them all in the dust.
Even The She-Bitch was well behaved. We even traded a couple of jokes. The only thing that made things at all uncomfortable was when Cunt downed half a bottle of wine and started making pointed references to my "abandonment" of my family.
I also got back in touch with Rogue. I call her "Rogue" because she has that same sort of sweetly innocent exterior masking a tempting devilishness as the character from X-Men. She also has crush on Wolverine. No, not Hugh Jackman. She has a crush on the actual character Wolverine.
She was, for the most part, my first girlfriend. When I was in Junior High in Boise, I met her through my cousin. She was a lot of "firsts" for me. There always was, and always will be, a very special place in my heart for her. She's talented, smart, and soulful. She's also very, very hot. She's sexy in that subtle "who do I have to kill for a chance to sleep with you" sort of way. As we said our goodbyes, she gave me a very nice kiss, then made me promise to call her the next time I was in town. That was about 80 hours ago, and I'm still smiling.
My homesickness took effect, of course. The warm reception I got from my kids and my friends really made me miss the old days when I could call on them any day of the week. But, like I said, it felt a bit out of place. The only reason a big deal was being made was because I had been gone in the first place. If I had never even left, perhaps no one would have been that excited to see me.
I want to go back to Portland now. I want to be near my kids, near my friends. But I'm not ready to give up yet. I've set a goal for myself and I would be remiss in my duties as a role-model if I gave up just because it got too hard and people kept saying not-nice things about me.
A few weeks ago, Kitten asked me how long I was going to give myself before I gave up and turned back to the Road More Traveled. I responded, "I don't know. How long would you give yourself before you gave up on everything you ever wanted?"
This is who I am. Would all those people who were so happy to see me care for me as much if I was not the kind of guy who truly beleived in something? If I were just another accountant working a 9 to 5 desk job, not really doing anything that sparks my passion, would anyone be that interested in what I have to say or how I say it? Would my children continue to look up at me, even though I was only an empty husk.
I've seen what happens to that kind of people. The city of Chicago is choked full of people who have abandoned any true passion in order to simply "pay the bills." These people spend a lot of time drunk and stoned. Anything to keep that hole in their soul from imploding on them.
I can't be like that. I need to have a real life. Even if it is a life of failure and disappointment, at least I can look my children in the eye and tell them how important it is to never give up.
I will return to my home town. I'm going to give myself one year in China. After that, I will move back to Portland to be with my kids. The kind of homecoming that will be depends entirely on what happens in China.
Stay tuned.
Well, if you believe the rumors, The Lovely And Talented Christina Ricci (her full name) has broken off her relationship with Adam "Hebrew Hammer" Goldberg. She's decided to trade him in for Justin "Cameron Diaz's Trophy Wife" Timberlake.
Now, I'm aware that the free world has been waiting with bated breath to hear my reaction to this news, so here it is:
"Fuckin' beautiful!"
No, that's not sarcasm. This really is great news to me.
You see, the fact that Her Divine Perfection would nurse a 2.5 year relationship with Adam Fuckin' Goldberg, only to dump him for Justin Fuckin' Timberlake can only mean one thing; she has really bad taste in men!
See where I'm going with this? All I need is one chance to meet her face to face, and she'll fall for me like a penny from a skyscraper. I'm lamer than both those assholes combined. I'm in baby!
So, back to work I go on that Christina Ricci vehicle script I've been toying around with. I ain't gettin' any younger.
Boysies!
PS.
This is to say, IF you beleive the rumors. I don't. But a guy can hope, can't he?
PPS.
Just for the record, The Hebrew Hammer was a fuckin' great movie.
